How this Book can Help You

This short book is part 2 of my 4-part series on PLC programming. This Part 2 is an exhaustive collection of my tutorials and demo videos on how you can advance your knowledge of PLCs by working with PowerFlex 525 family of Variable Frequency Drives.

You will find this book very helpful if you are an electrician, an instrumentation technician, a manufacturing operator, an automation professional or engineer looking to looking to progress their career or level up their knowledge of PLC hardware and PLC programming skills.

There are 5 chapters in this book. They are accompanied with 16 in-depth HD demo videos that you can download. These videos simplify everything you need to understand, and help you speed up your learning of Allen-Bradley’s PowerFlex 525 drives and how to install them within a manufacturing environment. There is also a link in this book for you to download my PLC programs (codes) for your revision.

Since I assume you have little knowledge of PowerFlex 525 Drive and PLC programming, I prepared this book in such a way that when you read it and study the accompanying demo videos (16 episodes), you will not only have an in-depth knowledge of the different parameters which need to be configured in order to properly setup and utilize the PowerFlex 525 VFD, you will be able to make sense of the documentation, and gain a lot of job experience you need to build innovations and earn higher salaries.

In this book, I start with the basics, that is, connecting power and turning on the PowerFlex 525 hardware, and then move on to the control methods that don't even require you have the hardware. Then I proceed to the advanced control methods that utilize the EtherNet/IP protocol, as well as a CompactLogix 1769-L24ER-QB1B PLC. This will help you develop confidence in working with these Variable Frequency Drives.

So, after studying this book and the demo videos, you should develop a hands-on approach to wire a PowerFlex 525 drive, setup the parameters and control it with a Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) and be able to use it in real world industrial applications.

The best way to master PLC programming is to use real world situations. The real-world scenarios and industrial applications developed in this book and its accompanying video demos will help you learn better and faster many of the functions and features of RSLogix 5000 platform.

The methods presented in the demo videos are those that are usually employed in the real world of industrial automation, and they may be all that you will ever need to learn.

Merely having a PLC user manual or referring to the help contents is far from enough in becoming a skillful PLC programmer. Therefore, this book is extremely useful for building PLC programming skills.

One of the questions I get asked often by beginners is, where can I get a free download of RSLogix software to practice? I provide later in this book links to a free version of the RSLogix Micro Starter Lite (which is essentially the same programming environment as the RSLogix 500 Pro) and a free version of the RSLogix Emulate 500.

In Chapter 4, I also provide links to download the demo edition of RSLogix 5000 / Studio 5000 Logix Designer to your system. Make sure you create an account at RockwellAutomation.com first. So, you don’t even need to have a full-blown PLC to learn, run and test your ladder logic programs.

I do not only show you how to get these important Rockwell Automation software for free and without hassle, I also show with HD videos how to install, configure, navigate and use them to write ladder logic programs.